chicken

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[edit] English

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Chicken portrait.jpg

[edit] Etymology

From Middle English, from Old English ċicen, cycen (“chicken”), diminuitive of coc, cocc (“cock, rooster”). Cognate with Dutch kuiken (“chick, chicken”), Low German küken (“chicken”), German Küken (“chick”), German dialectal Küchlein (“chicken”). More at cock, -en.

[edit] Pronunciation

[edit] Noun

chicken (countable and uncountable; plural chickens)

  1. (countable) A domestic fowl, Gallus gallus, especially when young
  2. (uncountable) The meat from this bird eaten as food.
  3. (countable, slang) A coward.
  4. (countable, gay slang) A young, attractive, slim man, usually having little body hair. Cf. chickenhawk
  5. (countable, slang) A young or inexperienced person.
    • 1887, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet, III:
      "This case will make a stir, sir," he remarked. "It beats anything I have seen, and I am no chicken."
  6. A confrontational game in which the participants move toward each other at high speed (usually in automobiles); the player who turns first to avoid colliding into the other is the loser.
  7. The game of dare.

[edit] Synonyms

[edit] Derived terms

Terms derived from chicken (noun)

[edit] Related terms

[edit] Translations

bird
meat
coward
young, attractive, slim man — see twink

[edit] Adjective

chicken (comparative more chicken, superlative most chicken)

  1. cowardly

[edit] Verb

chicken (third-person singular simple present chickens, present participle chickening, simple past and past participle chickened)

  1. (intransitive) To avoid as a result of fear.
  2. (intransitive) To develop physical or other characteristics resembling a chicken's, for example, bumps on the skin.

[edit] Derived terms

[edit] See also

[edit] Anagrams

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